Letter to Oli: On How I Consume Podcasts and Take Notes (Zettelkasten)

Hi Oli,

It was so nice to read your letter replying to mine. It makes me feel so grateful for this downtime during the holidays, that we have the time and space to do fun stuff like this.

Thanks for checking out David Senra’s podcast. It seems like it ‘landed’, and I love the feeling when a recommendation lands.

As much as I’d love to, it feels a bit excessive to keep writing a public letter every time in reply. But you had a question that I wanted to answer in detail, so here it is!

Your question: How do I consume my podcasts?

How do you consume your podcasts though? What does that look like in your day to day? There’s so many hours of content out there, I’m not really able to listen to it and do something else (besides walking / exercising). Do you listen to podcasts all the way through in one sitting? Do you allow yourself to stop half way through or skip around? Do you have any recommendations for how to capture bits that you want to follow up on later?

Here’s how I consume my podcasts:

I use Pocket Casts. I listen mostly when taking walks and washing dishes. By design, we don’t have a dishwasher. This is because I love washing the dishes by hand, mostly to listen to podcasts!

I treat podcasts as entertainment. Sure I learn a lot from them – as I also do from movies and tv shows – but they are entertainment first and foremost.

What does "podcasts as entertainment" imply?

First, I ruthlessly curate the podcasts I subscribe to. If I subscribe to one that I don't bother to listen to for weeks, I remove it. No "shoulds" here. The only shows in my podcast app are shows I actually listen to.

Second, similar to how Naval Ravikant reads books:

Feel free to skip around; it’s your book. There are books that I’ve literally started in the middle. I’ve read near to the end and then I’ve put it down... That liberation, that freedom just allows me to read.

Yes, I jump around and stop halfway, then (maybe) continue weeks later. It’s entertainment 😁

Here’s my podcast queue in Pocket Casts. Notice the 400 hours time remaining and the next episodes in queue having 37m left, 2h49m left, 14m left…

How do I capture bits I want to follow up on later?

My overarching framework is that of Zettelkasten as explained in Bob Doto's book, A System for Writing. The words I will use (e.g. fleeting note, sleeping note, etc.) come from that world.

First, I capture interesting thoughts and ideas that I want to follow up on later via my Zettelkasten in Craft. Specifically I create ‘fleeting notes’, which I will then process or move later into either main notes or just move to my sleeping notes folder.

Second, I have a ‘task’ in my task manager (TickTick) that recurs every week to ‘process fleeting notes’.

I am not vigilant about this. It’s a reminder. Some weeks, I will obsessively do it on a Saturday morning. Some weeks, I won't have the time, energy, or interest, and merely mark the task as "won't do".

I hope this helps, and I'd also love to learn how you consume podcasts!

Chiara